Press enter after choosing selection

For The Liberty Press

For The Liberty Press image
Parent Issue
Day
14
Month
July
Year
1848
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

So often and constnntly, do vo hear froin politicians, through tlio editorial presa, public meetings, and conventions, in legislativo halls, and gubernatorial nnd othor messagen, tho admission or assert on that there are cortaia compromises in the Constitution of tlio United States, n favor of, and suslaining Slavery, that it seenis to me it is time tho public mind should be undeceived and disabused upon this subject. Eut in taking tho ground and undortaking to prove tliat there is no such comj)roinise in the Constitution, and tliat Congrcss possoss tho legitímate authority to repealand abolish Slavery, not only in the Federal District, and in the territories of the United States, but in the Stntoa themselves; I by no mqpns wish to be understood as favoring tho present adoption of any such course by Congress, even were a majority of both Houses and an Executive, in favor of universal emancipation. Because such a course is unnecessary - there being other means and measures, which, with loss opposition, will effect tho same object, and without nny danger of revolution or cecession, which so strong, (though legal,) a mensure, inight produce. If asked what those measures uro, I unswer tho first, and I venturo to say, one which would very soon prove omnipotent, is to let the slavcholders, the quartcr of a inillion of despots, who have hitherto ruled (or rathor misruled,) the millions of this nation, nnderstand, that wc and tho world generally, semi-barbarous, monarchical, and despotic, as well as civilized and liberal, aro at last awake to the fact, that they are praclicallg, if not theoretically, tyrants and despots. And while they continue to trample the übprties, and social and civil, as well as religieus rights, of even one, not to say millions of our own nntive born Americans in the dust - while they compel the sexes by millions to herd togethcr, and live and breed, in the same marnier as the cattle in their shambles - while they deprive millions of their conntrymen of education, the Bible, and the biobt to worship God wben, where, and as often as they will and according to the dictates oi their own consciences - and while they permit laws to stain the statute books of their States or the nation, which, legitimately executed, will produco these results - whntevor inay be their professions, they are entirely incapable by habit and association, and entirely unfit, by principie and practice, to rule and govern a Republin, and therefore can nevor receivo the sulïraes of freernen and christians. And I hazard nothing in asserting, that before a second P residen tiol term shall havearrived, steps will have been taken by slavebolders themselves for the final and speedy abolition of the entire system. For there is probably, scarcely an enlightcned slaveholder in the Union, who will notadmit, that as far as regards (heir pecuniary and social prosperity, the system of Slavery, is a curse, a dead weight: and it lins long since been admitted that a general system of education for tho inasses, cancot be successfully sustained in slaveholding communities. - lt may, therefoie be asked ngain, as it has often jefore been asked, why then. is it that slaveholdors idhere with such indomitable tenacity, to a systcn whose tendency, in these important particulars, is so utterlv at war with their true, their best interest 8 7 The answer is at hand - men, as all rience shows, wil] yield up, notonly pecuniary, and social, but public and national prosperity - -nay, nlmost tsvery otlier interest, nt the bidding of ambition, - political nnibition. Therefore, while the grovelling subserviency of the rest of the nation - the nearly 20,000,000 of quasi freemen - will permit the continuance of the infamous liypocrisy, of supportiug tyrnnts and despots for repubücan office, so long, nnd no longer, will Sluvery continue. ]t is unnecessary to more than alltide to other measures, within the admitted power of Congress, which would have a strong, and some of them, nn overwhelming influence for the destruction of Slaverv - such as its abolition in the District of Columbia - the repeal of all those laws unconstitutionally passed by Congress, directly or indirectly supportiug and defending Slavery - the entire divorce of the conuexion now existing between the Federal Government, through its various oflicers, and the system of Slavery - and, thnugh last, not least, the abolition of the AMERICAN slave trade. With these preliininary remarks, I close this number, with the intiination, that if nothing prevents, I will in future consider tlie following ]ropo sition - "Tht the Constitution of the United States contains no comproinise in favor of Slavery - but on the contrary, is au Anti-Slavery instrument."